Book Review: The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

I don't even like alcohol. The taste or the effect.

Rachel catches the same commuter train every morning. She knows it will wait at the same signal each time, overlooking a row of back gardens. She’s even started to feel like she knows the people who live in one of the houses. ‘Jess and Jason’, she calls them. Their life – as she sees it – is perfect. If only Rachel could be that happy.

And then she sees something shocking. It’s only a minute until the train moves on, but it’s enough.

Now everything’s changed. Now Rachel has a chance to become a part of the lives she’s only watched from afar.

Now they’ll see; she’s much more than just the girl on the train…

Ar the awkward the experience of having a main character with the same name as you. Correct spelling and all. You probably heard about about this book by now, especially as the film adaptation is currently in theatres as I type. The big thing is this has been compared to is Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn which I have yet to read, I will compare it to this instead or I might just straight disagree. The question is does meet up to the hype. The answer is mostly 'Yes'.

The novel is mostly told from Rachel present POV with Megan POV of the past. Rachel is drunk often and has blackouts so we can't trust her narrative. Megan just leaves giant chunks out for no real reason other mystery and plot. 

The plot is mostly just Rachel stumbling around drunk. While not being a obvious, it's all very convenient. In terms of matching up all the narratives, they was a point that felt would have been better if we had gotten a vital piece of information in the other narrative and I would have changed them around personally, but each to their own and I'm clearly not a best selling author. I get what the Hawkins was going for but the solution didn't really work for me fully. I just don't buy it. The ending was rather meh.

The characters were okay. They all meant to be flawed and I think this is done in the realistic way. I've seen on Goodreads that a lot of people straight up hated them, but honesty, while they do unlikable and regrettable things I don't get the hate for all of them. I hated Anna, but pretty sure you're meant to. Rachel's ex-Husband Tom is totally unappealing and I don't get why anyone would want him, never mind two women.

I listened to the Audio book with Clare Corbett, India Fisher and Louise Brealey voice acting. I found them to be good and well casted. The only thing that was slightly off putting is when two of the voice actors did completely different interpretation of the same character, especially as I really liked the first one I was exposed to.

Overall, I give this book 4/5 stars for canned gin. I enjoyed listening to this novel. Definitely over hyped but also a decent Thriller novel so I would recommend it if that what you like to read.